Today’s question is from Stephen and it is one I’ve heard numerous times over the last couple of years, I’ll read it out. I have a Facebook page for my business so do I really need a website? So there’s a phrase used in marketing and I definitely didn’t coin it, but it’s very relevant to the answer to this question. And the phrase is don’t build your house on rented land. In this example, the rented land that we’re talking about here is your Facebook page, but it could be any social media site because at the end of the day, you don’t call the shots for what happens on Facebook. For example, I’ll go back 10 plus years when Facebook started first, and you would have set up your business page at the time, if you had, you know, I don’t know, let’s say a hundred followers or a hundred people had liked your page and you put a post up on that page.
A sizable amount of those people would see that post because Facebook would show them that post now fast forward to today and whether you know it or not, Facebook is only showing your posts to less, less than 3% of the people who like your page. Let’s take a minute just to drink that in 3%. So we call this organic reach. So it’s your reach on social media, where you’re not paying Facebook or any social media site, any money to show your posts to people. But that’s just an example of how any of these social media sites can turn around tomorrow and enforce any new kind of rule or put some kind of changes on their site that could potentially cripple your business. If that’s the only place you have built your home again, in this instance, this is the rented land. So you don’t call the shots on social media.
So if you are relying on, uh, any social media page alone, and to promote your business and again, you’re going to put time into the page. You’re going to build a page over the years and years and years, you just, you don’t call the shots. It’s never yours. You’re only ever squatting or your only ever really renting that piece of land. The opposite is your website. Your website is where you call the shots and you control everything that happens there. Now, of course, I’m not bad mouthing social media. There’s definitely a place for social media. And honestly, I think at some point in your business in the early days, maybe you won’t be able to afford a website and that’s fine. A Facebook page will do the job for now. And when you’re ready to invest, you can go for that website.
